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Council rejects pay increase for EU staff

The Council of Ministers has rejected the pay rise that the European Commission proposed for EU staff for 2011, arguing that current austerity measures in the member states make any increase inappropriate. It will also challenge the Commission in the European Court of Justice (ECJ) over the approach taken to the review of staff pay this year.

The Commission had proposed a pay rise of 1.7% for EU civil servants working in Brussels and Luxembourg, but a meeting of EU environment ministers on Monday (19 December) gave formal endorsement to the decision reached by ambassadors the previous Friday to throw the proposal out. The increase is below the rate of inflation in Belgium.

The ECJ challenge results from the Commission’s repeated refusal to follow the Council’s demand that an exception clause in the staff pay regulations should be invoked to suspend this year’s EU staff pay review. The annual review takes into account the levels of pay of civil servants in eight member states as well as changes in the cost of living, but the procedure can be suspended if there is “a sudden and serious deterioration in the economic and social situation”.

Majority approval

The Council decisions were approved by a majority of member states. Belgium, Luxembourg, Portugal and Romania abstained from a vote on rejecting the pay increase. Belgium, Bulgaria, Italy, Luxembourg, Italy, Poland and Romania abstained from the decision to take the issue to court.

The Commission had twice declined to respond to member states’ request for a pay freeze, in July and November, dismissing the suggestion that the conditions for triggering the exception clause were met. Adjustments already made to civil servants’ pay reflected the impact of the economic crisis, it said. Member states claim that the Commission failed to take sufficient account of the deterioration in economic growth rates over the past few months, with the result that its conclusions were “based on manifestly insufficient and erroneous grounds”.

After the Council meeting, a spokesman for Maroš Šefc?ovic?, the European commissioner for inter-institutional relations and administration, said the Commission was “carefully examining the decision.” The Commission “fully shared the Council’s anxiety” over finding budget savings, but, he underlined, the Commission was obliged to follow EU rules on how staff pay is reviewed.

Günther Lorenz, president of the Union Syndicale staff union, said the unions would file counter suits at the ECJ against the Council decision. He said the Council was “bound to lose” its case at the court because the case was similar to one member states lost two years ago. In 2009, member states refused to approve a 3.7% pay rise, which led to a court challenge against the member states by the Commission. The court upheld the complaint and the increase was paid.